My wife is convinced she 'caught me'. She giggled one night and mentioned how she caught me masturbating earlier that day. No big deal – there are no private moments when you are married. Except that I wasn't. So I asked her: "When?" She said: "This morning when you were in the bathroom, you were standing at the toilet. I came up behind you and you had your arm up like you were cheering." She thought it was cute.

WTF? Consider what she is insinuating about me. That I am so crude that I jerk off into a disgusting toilet bowl?! What could possibly get me aroused while in a bathroom – while standing at a stinky toilet bowl no less? "Check out the curves on that Gillette Venus razor, yeah, baby." Or: "The silhouette on that shampoo bottle is so hot. Look at the lather on her!"

The only thing in my line of sight was some small bottles of perfumes and colognes, cotton swabs, baby medicine, and nail scissors. If I craned my neck slightly to the right a few strands of damp hair and smudged toothpaste around the sink. Sexy! That is probably the last place I would ever consider doing that act. But her accusation – and yes I am treating it as such – needs defending. Now I wonder how much she really knows me.

Is this what women think of men? That the only thing we need to get off is a place to easily dispose of our junk? I am not some masturbating monkey in a zoo. I have standards. I treat excess honey on a spoon better than that.

And what of this reference that I "cheered" myself on as if I am in a race or a contest of strength – with myself – and won. I may not be the most successful guy in the world, but even I set higher goals than that.

When have I ever in the final moments of our love-making cheered myself on with encouragement like: "Yes, you can do it! He shoots, he scores!” Then jumped out of bed to shout “I am number one! I am number one!" I have never viewed sex as a sport or athletic in any way (you would have to work up a sweat to do that). But just to get back at her the next time we hop into bed I will insist on doing some jumping jacks first, put on a headband and put an energy drink by the bed. I might even insist on stopping to check the video replay.

She also said it was not the first time she caught me. Holy crap! Where else has she thought she caught me? And why hide from it? If I was raising the flag pole, would she not want to possibly join in or take it further? (Don't tsk-tsk me – that is what you were thinking too.)

Then I started thinking of all the other places I "cheered" myself on, at least in the traditional meaning of the world: during a game of Trivial Pursuit with the neighbours? (I finally got a science question right.) When I made record time to the cinema? (Obviously not. Imagine getting pulled over by the police and the officer asking: "Why are your pants in the back seat and why were you cheering when you sped past me?”) When everyone else at the restaurant declined the last chicken wing? (There is no way I am brave enough enough to do that to myself after handling spicy food.)

Then it hit me: there are not many times in my life when I am justified in cheering myself on. I am not rich, I will never win the Oscar or any other major award, my car is old and always filthy, and I buy my clothes at Costco. But I have a hot wife who thinks wanking is 'cute'. Awesome! I guess I will continue to cheer on the little things in life.